Darkling
<--- back to Seemings Description Changelings know that their deeds have consequences, but few feel those consequences so keenly as the changelings who are called Darklings. Many were stolen away as the consequence of attracting the attention of the Fae. Their obsessive clinging to the solace of the night is the consequence of having been imbued with shadows. Their love of quiet is the consequence of having lived in a world where all was whispering, all was rustling and snapping twigs and creeping fear. The Darklings believe that they found it hardest to escape from the lands of the Fae, because their way back was hidden from them. Of all the changelings, they were lost in an alien landscape, with no reference point to return to, with all paths shrouded in shadow. To escape, they had to be the ones who could survive in the shadows, to thrive there with creeping things and dark things and dead things that move. Having come back, they are the changelings who wait in the shadows. The Darklings' memories of their time in Faerie are awash with shadowy fears. Vague, hulking forces loomed from the corner of the room. Small skittering things crawled across faces or became momentarily tangled in hair before dissolving. Wet, slithering things moved around in the background. Trap doors and boarded windows with something behind them figure heavily in dreams of Faerie. Being sent on errands with no point, being forced to copy ancient codices of lore that made no sense while outside things shrieked and fluttered, being made to enter a cellar and being eaten, over and over again, being lost in mazes, all of these things feature heavily in Darkling dreams of faerie. The dark places of the human world don't remotely compare. Appearance Darklings tend to appear somehow less solid, less substantial than other changelings. It's not that they're transparent or anything. They just feel less solid somehow. Many (but not all) are thin, in their fae miens unnaturally so. Many are tall, and the ones who aren't are only shorter than normal because they're hunched over. Some have pointed ears and noses. Some have straight, lank hair. Skin runs the gamut from deathly white to transparent, shadowy black or blue. Their eyes are almost always dark, like deep pits that reveal nothing. Sometimes, in their fae miens, they have freakish features, like tiny horns or fangs, extra eyes and the like. Contracts Darklings gain an affinity with the Darkness Contracts, allowing them to use darkness as a thing of distraction and fear. Kiths :*Antiquarian: Those Darklings who surround themselves with dusty tomes of lore and the artifacts of long-dead lands and peoples. :*''Gravewight'': Cold-skined Darklings who draw comfort from the consorting with the dead, both restless and in repose. :*''Leechfinger'': The faeries who steal life from humans, grain by grain, drop by drop, with just a touch. :*''Lurk Glider'': Changelings which glide through the night skies, like the Mothman. :*Mirrorskin: Darklings who hide in plain sight from humankind, able to assume any appearance at whim. Their bones are malleable and their faces flow like quicksilver. :*''Moonborn'': Changelings attuned to madness. :*''Nightsinger'': Changelings who can produce hypnotic songs. :*''Palewraith'': Changelings who hide in the shadows. :*''Razorhand'': Changelings who can transform their hands to sharp knives. :*''Tunnelgrub'': Those of the Darkling faeries who slide and slither through tunnels and sewers and chimneys, the better to do terrible things in the night. :*''Whisperwisp'': Changeling who listen silently from the darkness. See Also For a List of Darklings see Darkling. Category:Seeming